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Wednesday, August 19, 2015

Saints for the Year of Mercy {Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati}

Love this guy.

The Year of Mercy is a unique opportunity to teach kids about Saints that they might not have previously encountered. All Saints are recipients of God's radical mercy, but some stand out as examples that can help us model extending and receiving mercy.

Here are seven Saints that I plan to teach about during this Year of Mercy:

St. John Paul II- ushered in devotion to Divine Mercy, canonized St. Faustina, lifetime example of love and forgiveness in words and actions (I have activities about JP2 here and here)

St. Faustina Kowalska- received visions of Divine Mercy, messenger chosen by Jesus to share with the world (For a craft project explaining the symbolism in Faustina's vision of Jesus go here)

St.Maximilian Kolbe- spread the light of the faith across the world during a dark era, and showed immense mercy by putting the needs and lives of others before his own (For a cross-curricular unit on the life of St. Max go here)

St.John Vianney- remembered for many things, including spending 16 hours a day in the Confessional, priest who is a great example of the importance of the mercy God extends to us in the Sacraments

St. Paul- example of receiving great mercy after conversion from former sinful life, wrote often in the New Testament about grace, mercy and salvation. (Read more here) (I have a St. Paul coloring page here.)

Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati- With great sacrifice to self, Pier Giorgio lived out the Corporal Works of Mercy by serving the sick and poor. (For mini books and a coloring page about the Corporal Works of Mercy go here)

Our Lady of Mercy- Mary is the utmost example of both receiving God's mercy and bringing Mercy into the world. (for a list of activities I have about Mary go here and scroll down the page)

Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati will officially be our CCD Patron Saint for the year. The kids will learn about his life and how they can follow his model to better love God and their neighbors. I made this hallway display to introduce the kids to my friend Pier:

The beautiful poster and postcards are products from Cassie Pease Designs. (LOVE her stuff. LOVE. She has tons of gorgeous free wallpapers to download in addition to her products.) I added some basic facts about his life around the pictures, as well as info about his connection to the Corporal Works of Mercy and the Beatitudes:

On another wall, I have this great poster from Pauline Media with a short story of his life on the back:

When I tried to find some coloring pages featuring Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati...I was disappointed...so I made my own. Here are four new coloring pages modeled after real photographs of Pier Giorgio and featuring some of my favorite quotes. Click on the image to download a pdf version of the coloring pages:

The Archdiocese of Melbourne has created some great resources about Pier Giorgio for youth. You can read their Archbishop's beautiful letter here and can see the videos I added to my playlist here.

What Saints do you think would be great to incorporate during the Year of Mercy?

7 comments:

Katie, I wanted to let you know of another resource for Bl. Pier Giorgio materials. Our order's (the Sister Servants of the Eternal Word) recently partnered with FrassatiUSA. We have the official holy cards, posters, stickers, Pact wristband kits, and the best books about him (including a wonderful little comic book about his life). If anybody wants to check out our page, you can visit it here: http://store.casamaria.org/bl-pier-giorgio-frassati/

Also, there is a great new video about a Bl. Pier Giorgio miracle called Giorgio. We have the DVD copies, but you can also check it out on youtube here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZk3ug-W4UY

Thanks so much for your shoutout to my designs page! :) I just want you to know that I absolutely LOVE your Frassati display and I was wondering if I could use your image to post about it on social media? Thanks so much! -Cassie

Cassie! I know I already said it in the post, but seriously- I LOVE your designs! Thanks for making beautiful things that show the holiness of these good men and women who direct us in the faith. Thank you! And yes- please feel free to share any of the images! Thanks for asking! :)

Thank you so much for all of your resources, I'm currently using different resources in my 5th grade classroom and in my 8th grade CCD classroom. This keeps me up on everything when I don't have time to make my own resources or cannot think of anything to do for certain themes. Keep up all that you do! You're a blessing to so many! :) God Bless!

"Not all are called to be artists in the specific sense of the term. Yet, as Genesis has it, all men and women are entrusted with the task of crafting their own life: in a certain sense, they are to make of it a work of art, a masterpiece." -Saint John Paul the Great

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